


Transparency

by rubygirl29



Category: Dresden Files - Jim Butcher
Genre: Community: hc_bingo, M/M, changes, ghost story
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-08-02
Updated: 2011-08-02
Packaged: 2017-10-22 03:47:22
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,044
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/233411
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rubygirl29/pseuds/rubygirl29
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John doesn't believe Harry is dead. He's right. Sort of.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Transparency

**Author's Note:**

> Spoilers: Changes and Ghost Story. Proceed with caution. However, these events didn't happen in Ghost Story ... but they could have.

Egyptian cotton sheets, down pillows, wool and cashmere blankets. A white noise machine and a perfect mattress, and John Marcone couldn't sleep.

Served him right. I was in that bedroom with him, standing over his right shoulder as he sat on the edge of the bed, scrubbing his eyes with the heels of his hands as if his head hurt. Served him right? Yeah, I was feeling petty. Hey, I'm a ghost. I have the right to be pissed about it.

He was thinner. The bones of his spine pressed ivory knobs against his skin. The white scars of his torture by the Denarians were too clear. I reached out, skimmed my hand over his back. He shivered, gooseflesh rising like a cold wind had breathed across his him.

He looked up. "Harry?" His voice was a quiet rasp and his eyes were red-rimmed and weary. "Damn you, Harry."

Me? What had I ever done to him? Well, plenty. Dragging him into realms of magic, exposing him to supernatural beings, putting him in the hands of the Denarians -- I still had nightmares about that one.

"John?" I just wanted to know if he could hear me.

He drew in a breath. "Stop haunting me so I can go to sleep."

Hmm. That was ... inconclusive. "Fuck you, John," I whispered in his ear.

No response to that, so, no. He couldn't hear me.

"Fuck you, Harry." He lay down. He slept naked. I knew that. I knew the contours of his body, his scars, his muscles. The way his flesh quivered when I touched him, the rise of his cock when he was aroused. He made a small, choked sound, and his hand drifted down the lean plane of his stomach to his groin. He took himself in his hand with a soft groan.

I swear, i felt a frisson of very human arousal at the sight. I wrapped my hand around his. It was like holding water; insubstantial but inevitably _there_. His hand pumped harder, his breath coming in harsh gasps until his hips jerked up and semen spurted, smearing his stomach and groin. I could smell the salty musk of his come, or was it just memory playing me false?

I drew my finger through the moist beads on his skin. I bent and blew across the head of his cock. His eyes flew wide in surprise.

 _Holy Crap! Had he felt that?_

He was still, eyes wide and dark so that the thin iris of dollar green looked impossibly vivid. I sighed. If it were possible for a ghost to ache with need, I was aching for John. He reached out, passed through me, like a warm current. I opened my sight and looked into his eyes. We had soul-gazed; I had seen all that he was, but that was before we were lovers. Before I had, umm, _died_. I had seen the tiger in his soul. The tiger wasn't the jungle predator I had seen that first time. He was locked in a dark cage with bars forged of loss, grief and cold anger. He was captive, pacing the confines restlessly. His coat was dull, only his eyes flamed with life. I shut down the soul-gaze. All that emotion burned me like acid.

"Damn you, Harry!" John got out of bed; the light limning his body as he crossed to the window. "Damn you," he whispered. He poured whiskey into a crystal glass. I went to him, pressed a kiss to the knob of bone at the back of his neck. He shivered again, then whirled and flung the glass against the wall. It shattered into diamonds and Hendricks burst through the door, his gun drawn.

"Boss!"

John sank down on the bed. "God, Hendricks. Don't you sleep?"

"No." He draped a robe over John's shoulders. "Don't move. You'll get glass in your feet."

As if that could hurt more than the shattered soul I had seen. I had to leave. I couldn't leave. Hendricks returned and swept up the glass fragments. "Don't wander around in your bare feet," he said. "I don't know if I got it all."

"Go back to bed. I'm fine," John said, his voice dull. When Hendricks was gone, he picked up his phone. "I'm going insane, but other than that, I'm fine." He pressed a number on speed dial. "Gard, we're taking a trip. Get the jet ready. We're going to Rome."

 _NO!_ If I'd had a voice, I would have screamed. Rome? Was he insane? Well, yes, he thought he was. What the fuck was he going to do in Rome? Hunt down some artifact that could bring me back to life? He'd already tried the Shroud. He wasn't likely to tempt fate again and I had no idea what else was out there. So many relics and invocations for sale by charlatans and dark forces that I couldn't wrap my incorporeal brain around them.

Bob would know. Meanwhile, I was stuck here in Chicago, my murder unsolved, all hell breaking loose.

"Fine." I said. "Go chasing after the Holy Grail. It won't do you any good. I'm a ghost, you idiot."

"I'm an idiot," John sighed. "But I have to try, Harry. Life was a lot easier when I was just the crime lord of Chicago."

Okay, this was weird, this _conversation_ that really wasn't one. Oh, well. It wasn't like we were really talking. "Aww, you miss me. I'm touched."

"I miss you."

"I know." I sat next to him on the bed, kissed his shoulder. "Somehow, I think we'll meet again."

"Somehow, I think you're alive. Somewhere."

I snorted. "No shit, Sherlock." I slid a finger down his arm. "Gotta go and solve a mystery. Don't rob the Vatican. It won't work. You might as well plumb the Nevernever instead, Lord of the Unseelie lands," I snorted.

But he wasn't listening. Whatever contact we had was ephemeral as the mist. It was getting to be daylight and I had to get back to my ... umm ... My little piece of Chicago real estate. I drifted away, leaving him as he lay back down, resolute in his determination to find the truth of my demise. My friend, my lover, my demon.

 **The End**


End file.
